Week with Jenna

As I mentioned in my Thankful Thursday post we were blessed to be able to spend a week with our niece Jenna.  Her parents went to Bolivia for a mission trip and left one of their three kids with us and the other two with Matt's parents.  We had so much fun!  Jenna was so sweet and easy on us the whole week.  Even though I know she missed her parents and siblings she was very happy to be spending time with us and especially her cousins!  That made the week even easier.  So here is what we did...

Sunday: Matt met his dad and picked up Jenna before church.  Then we took Jenna to church.  Even though she'd been there before I think the transition was to quick so she seemed a little hesitant about going to Sunday school with Grace.  I just asked if she'd rather sit in church with Matt and I and she chose that.  She just say quietly on my lap the whole time.  That was the only special thing about that day and I'm pretty sure we just played the rest of the day.

Monday: Monday was pretty warm so we go some time to play outside.  We also had a friend over for a playdate.  Jenna had a lot of fun meeting a new friend and I think she played with Aubrey more than Grace did.

Tuesday:  I decided on Tuesday that I wanted to brave taking the kids out.  I had read about a new program our park district offers that I wanted to try out.  It's an hour and a half open gym for 0-5 year olds at a park district building.  It does cost $2 per child but was totally worth it.  We had a whole gym full of toddler and preschool toys almost completely to ourselves.  The kids had tons of fun running around and playing with different toys.  I'll definitely be going back in the cold winter months!  Below are some pictures of the open gym.

Wednesday: After a successful outing to the gym on Tuesday I decided to take the kids to the pumpkin patch on Wednesday.  It was pretty crowded but the kids were wonderful and easy to manage.  Grace injured herself at the end of our time there so we did have a very dramatic trip back to the car but other than that it was really fun.  Below are some pictures of the pumpkin patch.

Thursday: Thursday we just hung around the house for the morning and after nap/rest time Matt came home from work a little early.  Then we took the kids to the mall for supper, time to play in the play area and a little bit (maybe 5 minutes) of shopping.

Friday: We are so lucky to have an indoor park really close to us so on Friday we met Amy and her 2 girls there to play.  Then afterward we were brave and took the 5 kids our for lunch.  Later that night the Tarrs called to see if we wanted to meet them for dinner so we loaded up the mini-van (we borrowed Jenna's parents' van for the week) one last time and took them to a Thai restaurant.  We actually had a really nice meal mostly because it wasn't crowded, all of the kids ate well and when they were done eating the 4 girls (not Caleb because he's too little) crowded around an iPhone and played with that while the adults visited.

Saturday: This was our last day with Jenna so we just played at home, packed her stuff and had lunch together.  After lunch Matt left to take her back to her parents.  I got really attached to her while she was here so I was so sad to say goodbye.  After she left Grace said, "I miss Jenna so much and I love Jenna so much."  I'll be glad to see her (and her brother and sister) again at Thanksgiving!

We had such a fun week.  We also had time to play with stickers, magnetic paper dolls, paint with water colors, and paint pumpkins.  Finally, here is one more fun picture of the girls together in matching outfits I couldn't resist buying for them...